Co-habiting & Trusts of Land

If you have been living with your partner, but you are not married, you are in legal terms ‘cohabiting’. When cohabitees separate they are not treated by the law in the same way as married couples seeking divorce. It does not matter whether you have been cohabiting for months, years or even decades: cohabitees have considerably fewer rights arising from their relationships.

Unless the parties have a valid Cohabitation Agreement setting out what is to happen on relationship breakdown, the only financial redress for a cohabitant is to make an application to the court for an Order for the property to be sold and/or a declaration of the ownership of the property.

The court may need to consider how a property is legally owned between the cohabiting couple and the Judge can resolve disputes between former cohabitees in respect of the ownership of property.

Specialist advice from an experienced solicitor will be required in relation to this complicated area of law and at Mills Chody LLP we have considerable experience of helping clients to establish an interest in a property when their relationship with their former cohabitee has broken down.